A blog for the United States branch of the global Centre for Fortean Zoology

At the beginning of the 21st Century monsters still roam the remote, and sometimes not so remote, corners of our planet. It is our job to search for them. The Centre for Fortean Zoology [CFZ] is - we believe - the largest professional, scientific and full-time organisation in the world dedicated to cryptozoology - the study of unknown animals. Since 1992 the CFZ has carried out an unparalleled programme of research and investigation all over the world. Since 2009 we have been running the increasingly popular CFZ Blog Network, and although there has been an American branch of the CFZ for over ten years now, it is only now that it has a dedicated blog.

In the back woods and swamps of the good old USA a strange kind of creature is said to lurk. Reported all across the USA, but mostly in the South they are never found far away from water. Hiding, stalking, waiting for the right moment to strike. They are the Reptiloids, creatures reported to be a bizarre cross between man and reptile.

I have to admit that human-like Reptiloids have always been a touchy subject for me when it comes to Cryptozoology. They definitely rank among the creatures I have had the most doubts about existing (along with flying humanoids and chimera beasts like the original 1995 Chupacabra). Yet I realized that my assertion was more on a personal level than any research put into it. So I decided to take the time necessary to try and get to the bottom of it. What exactly did the eyewitnesses have to say about what they saw? What were other researchers saying about it? I wanted to try and find out.

Without a doubt the most famous of all Reptiloids is the Bishopville Lizard Man. Just put Lizard Man into any of the major internet search engines and it will always be in the top five results shown. And it all started on a morning in July 1988.

On July 14, deputies received a call about damage, possibly by vandals, to a car owned by the Waye family. During the course of the investigation little evidence was turning up and the officers began to hear whispers about some people seeing strange sights in the woods and swamps just outside town. These were vague and no one seemed to want to come forward with more details so, while more than a little strange, the officers were willing to let it go. Then Sheriff Liston Truesdale was talking with a friend he knew by the name of J.J. and the topic about the damaged vehicle and the strange things people where rumored to be seeing came up. Then J.J. simply responded to Truesdale’s inquires with, “What you mean that Lizard Man?”

There it was. A simple name yet one that conjures up such powerful imagery in a person’s mind. Just say it and your mind instantly creates a vivid image of a huge hulking cross between a man and a reptile. Where J.J. got the name from and why he decided to call it that is unclear, but there it was. At first only the local police investigating the incident knew of the name Lizard Man, but that was all about to change, as soon a new eyewitness would come forward and with his testimony thrust the little town of Bishopville and indeed the whole country into a Lizard Man Frenzy.

In the early morning hours of June 29, 1988 17-year old Christopher Davis was coming home from work when he pulled over to the side of the road just past the Scape Ore Swamp Bridge in order to change a flat tire. Just after finishing up he noticed in the bright moonlight something about 30 yards away from him coming out of the woods directly for him! Not surprisingly Chris decided to leave at once. As Chris tried to drive away, the creature attempted to first wrench open the door and then even climbed on top of the car.

Eventually he was able to lose is attacker and made it home. When he got there he told his father what had happened. He was so shaken up that he soon started to cry. His father took him into talk to the police a couple weeks later. There he told them his story and even drew a sketch of what he said he saw. He described it as approximately 7 feet tall, with red glowing eyes, greenish-brown skin that seemed to be wet or slimy, and three fingered claw-like hands. Sheriff Truesdale was inclined to believe the young man based on his sincerity and the fact that he really wasn’t trying to get any attention out of this. But that was just what they were all about to get.

Just after the incident, Emory Bedengaugh, a writer for The Item, a local newspaper, had heard of the attack on Chris and began to inquire about it. It was during an interview with Deputy Chester Lightly that he told Emory, “They call it Lizard Man.” Note that prior to this statement that no one had connected the colorful name J.J. had given to the Chris Davis account, yet that was the name Emory used in his report. Soon every newspaper around was relaying the story of young Chris Davis as well as the name Lizard Man.

Soon everyone was buzzing with talks of a strange half man and half reptile. Reporters from small towns to national news outlets, including Good Morning America, CNN, and Fox News were swarming over Bishopville asking for interviews. They quickly flooded the media with drawings of huge half men and half lizards spamming this model all over the place. And soon even radio station WCOS-FM was offering a one million dollar reward for anyone who could capture the beast alive. Before long the reporters began to confuse the popular image of a lizard man (one they created, mind you) with the original eyewitnesses whose accounts bear little or no resemblance to the popular image being touted.

Looking over at my pile of Cryptozoology related books on my reading list, I am happy to see so much well researched efforts by many different authors about this amazing subject. And even though I already read it, I just finished re-reading Lyle Blackburn’s amazing second book, Lizard Man: The True Story of the Bishopville Monster. This is one of (if not my favorite) Cryptozoology related books to come out in 2013. Now I read some other people’s reviews online and was a little surprised at some of the controversy I found, created by some, over it.

No, they were not saying it was bad, the controversy seemed to come from the apparent conclusion of the book. In it and spoiler alert for those haven’t read it (though I don’t know how you could spoil a cryptozoology book it’s not like a movie or anything) is that the creature behind the sightings are not creatures looking like the “classic idea” of the Reptiloids, namely the image of a large half man half lizard, similar to the Spider-Man comic book villain. His conclusion was that the creatures actually had a more like a typical Bigfoot appearance. This idea is strongly backed up by how a couple of eyewitnesses described a mysterious creature they saw one night.

In the fall of 1991 Brian and Michelle Elmore where driving on a road between the communities of Browntown and Cedar Creek at 12:30 am when they nearly collided with a huge animal as it ran across the road in front of them. They didn’t report their encounter to the police until May of the next year. Brian described the creature as being covered in brownish hair and looking like a gorilla only larger. Michelle was even more specific in her description even going as far as to say it looked just like a Sasquatch. This doesn’t prove that what the young couple saw that night was a Sasquatch or that Sasquatches exist, but what it does prove is that what they reported seeing was not reptile like at all.

So a pretty clear cut example of a classic Sasquatch encounter, yet a lot of people have tried to link this with what Chris Davis claimed to have seen, despite the two looking nothing like each other. I think this is mainly due to the fact that they took place around the same area.

Now this is an overlapping problem I’ve come to notice more and more in Cryptozoology: lumping unrelated sightings and creatures into the same kind of category. I think this may be done so as to make it easier for people to accept. I mean it is one thing to ask them to assume that a strange unknown animal is on the loose, but to ask them to consider that multiple strange unknown creatures are on the loose is even harder for some people. This is the same attitude the late Dr. Grover Krantz implied when other researchers tried to claim that instead of one “universal Sasquatch” there might be several unknown primate phenomena going on.

I can sympathize with him, but I must respectfully disagree. To try and lump unrelated things together, just to make it “more convenient” is wrong. It gives off the idea of lazy research and conclusions based on said lazy research. It’s the exact thing Cryptozoology should be staying away from. So back to the original question, does such a thing as a half man half lizard exist? I don’t know. What I can be sure of is that Cryptozoology and the questions it brings up about science, and even our psychologies at times, are far too complicated and important to just lump into one easy to swallow answer, be it a skeptical one or a more “believer” one.

Thursday, 27 February 2014

The moose, often called in Europe an elk (as distinct from the American elk or wapiti) has, in the past, been popularly supposed to hybridize with other creatures. A hybrid between a moose and a cow would generally be regarded as impossible by zoologists, yet a creature was born in 1939 which was suspected of being such. The balance of probability is it was just a rather unusual looking cow. I have, unfortunately, no further details of this case.Nor is it at all likely that a moose could cross with a horse, yet in Québec in 2006, a strange creature was born to a mare. The head and legs were reminiscent of a moose and the only male horses on the farm were geldings. It is not unknown for horses and moose to mate, but according to received wisdom, they should not produce offspring. The young animal was named Bambi.

There are two terms which should be dropped from the cryptozoological vocabulary - Injun Devil and Scotland Devil. These terms are used in a vague sense for any of various cryptids and are too non-specific for proper assessments. The first seems to be particularly popular in Maine, while the second seems to be applied chiefly and perhaps exclusively to felids.

Wednesday, 26 February 2014

Although there is a link to a report in the Scotsman below which says that Nessie wasn't seen in 2013, it now transpires that Gordon Rutter, a prominent Fortean, has stated that there were reports of alleged sightings.

Will they ever run out of cryptids in Puerto Rico? I hope one of these days someone does a complete survey. The Central Guanica is an old sugar mill and Puerto Ricans aver it has been for a long time home to a gargoyle-like creature that emerges and attacks livestock. It is also supposed to have attacked a human on one occasiion. There seems to be some possibility that the creature has wings.

If you're one of those who follows UFO sightings, you may be interested on one on February 22nd in Greenville (South Carolina).Go to: www.latest-ufo-com/north-america/ to which I am finding it impossible to provide a direct link. (Isn't technology wonderful?)

A horse-fly discovered in Queensland has been named after singer Beyoncé. The name was bestowed by Bryan Lessad of the Australian National Insect Collection. Its scientific name is Scaptia (Plinthina) beyonceae. The inspiration for the name came from the golden hairs on its lower abdomen.

I have been prompted to ask this question by Richard Freeman, ace cryptozoologist and leader of expeditions into the Farthest Wilds. His Facebook page shows news stories that would make you despair of the human race. However, one swipe at human limitations that he features is the story of Blondie Bennett (38) who wishes to be as much like Barbie (the doll) as possible. Not only has she undergone cosmetic surgery, but she has undergone hypnotherapy sessions to make her more stupid. She sees Barbie as a dumb blonde, I suppose. Did she really need those hypnotherapy sessions?I remember some years ago a medium told people she was able to channel messages from Barbie. Just how she thought she could do this, I cannot say. The manufacturers of Barbie, if my memory serves me, took legal action. Things like this make you wonder about the intellectual capacity of Homo sapiens to rule this planet.

Can anyone out there supply me with information on either of the following?(a) the Chevo Goatman, said to be found in California;(b) the Hoofed Horror, reported from Maine.I understand there is an old Pennsylvania saying which is roughly, "Don't go into the woods or the Forestman will get you." I presume the Forestman is the kind of booger used to keep children away from dangerous places, but is there a larger tradition of the Forestman as an entity in Pennsylvania folklore and does he differ from Bigfoot?

I have a dog. Her name is Sashy - we didn't give her that name, we took her from a dog shelter. She's the third dog I've had and I must admit I've been lucky with them all, in that they've been (generally) well behaved.However, a great deal of what goes on about her must be rather puzzling to her (if she's given to speculation). Moreover, her knowledge of the world she inhabits is very limited. She has no notion that she lives in a sea-surrounded isle, that there are continents, islands and oceans all around the world, that decisions made by humans thousands of miles away may impact upon her, that those very humans thousands of miles away actually exist and, if any members of the family go anywhere, she has no idea where they are going or why. She has no idea of the life any of us has away from home, none concerning people we know who have not visited the home, none concerning our jobs, even though all these things can have an effect upon her own life and sometimes do. There is an awful lot about the world that my dog does not and cannot know.She also does not know the reasons things happen to her. She may divine that I will not have yet another tug of war with her because I am tired, but she cannot answer such questions as Why do they not give me food whenever I want it? Why do they take me to that horrible place, the vet's? Why do they make me have baths? In short, why do they make me do This when I want to do That?You see, she cannot begin to comprehend the reasoning lying behind these decisions. The world around her is filled with questions which, bearing her state of mental development in mind, she cannot hope to answer. Now, what strikes me is, how many things are going on around us, Homo sapiens, of which we have no inkling, because we have no capacity to apprehend them, yet which may impinge upon our lives at any second or, indeed, be impinging upon them now, all unknown to us, because we have not the resources to know them?Well, that's enough profound thought for today. I have to walk the dog.

This is the site of a number of caves in the northern parts of the Caucasus. Local lore informs us that a monster lives in the caves, but the locals seem to have no inkling of what it looks like. Its existence seems to be inferred from the fact that both people and animals have disappeared in the vicinity. Whether there was a tradition of a monster anterior to these disappearances, I cannot say.Under the Soviet régime, it was decided to build a military center in the caves. In 1949 a party sent into them returned unscathed, but then a second party was sent in. It did not return. An investigation was carried out. One member of the party, or rather most of him, was found dead. The head had been removed. A second member was also found dead. He had had the flesh removed from his bones. The authorities decided somewhere else might be a more suitable locale for their center.This is all the information I have about this site and this incident. I would welcome further information on the matter. ?Not knowing what the Monster looks like, I have put in this question mark as an illustration.

Sunday, 23 February 2014

1807: Seventeen London residents die in the crush of
witnesses gathered to watch the hanging of murderers John Holloway, Owen
Heggerty and Elizabeth Godfrey.

1942: Rumors of enemy aircraft spark the one-sided
"Battle of Los Angeles," an overnight antiaircraft barrage lasting
into the next morning. Some modern Forteans blame the panic on UFOs. Steven
Spielberg gave the near-catastrophe a comic twist (and changed the date) in his
1979 film 1941.

1977: Witness Rudi Grutsch reports two humanoids with round
heads and slanted eyes, seen near a UFO AT Langenargen, Germany.

2013: Online rumors claim that a Bigfoot was shot on a
Navajo reservation in Arizona and secretly transported to Phoenix by unnamed
"officials." As with all such tales to date, no evidence has
surfaced.

1946: Texarkana's "Phantom Killer"—subject of the
film The Town That Dreaded Sundown—stages his first lover's lane attack.
Victims Jimmy Hollis and Mary Jeanne Larey survive, unlike others in the series
of still-unsolved shootings.

2007: The New Zealand fishing vessel San Aspiring nets a
giant squid in the Ross Sea, while trawling for Antarctic toothfish. It remains
largest extant cephalopod scientifically documented.

2014: Some experts on Norse mythology peg today as the start
of Ragnarök, ("Twilight of the Gods"), including a cosmic battle
claiming the lives of gods Odin, Thor, Týr, Freyr, Heimdallr, and Loki,
followed by various natural disasters ending with the Earth submerged in water,
awaiting repopulation by two human survivors. With any luck, they won't be Rush
Limbaugh and Ann Coulter.

Friday, 21 February 2014

Readers may remember in the stories of Winnie-the-Pooh that Tiggers don't climb trees. However, recent research has shown that crocodiles do. If pursued by a crocodile, therefore, the unhappy traveler is counselled not to climb trees. Crocodiles can run pretty fast too, so potential victims are urged to put a spurt on.

This may seem a rather unbelievable question, but, in fact, there is a tradition in Pennsylvania that he was. This was collected by folklorist MacEdward Leach from Clinton County.The story goes that the Great Spirits Spring lay at Windfall Run and that vapors rising from it were known as the Great Spirit's Breath. King Arthur and his men came walking through the forest so he might drink of the Spring's water, as he was sorely wounded. He did so and the water proved efficacious. He remained there, drinking the water for ten years, then he died and was buried. The grave was in the middle of Windfall Run, ten feet deep and Arthur was buried in a stone coffin.In 1951 some boys managed to open the grave, but it filled with water. In 1959 a politician fishing in the area fell into the grave and had to be hauled out of the water. The Forestry Department, at the politician's behest, filled the grave up.Regarding how such a legend might have grown up, in Arthurian legend, after the Battle of Camlann, Arthur was taken to the Otherworld by Morgan Le Fay, to be healed of his wounds. In some Celtic traditions, the Otherworld was beyond the Atlantic. If you venture across the Atlantic, you will bump into America. That may have given rise to an idea that America is where Morgan took him.For those wishing to read the original story, it is to be found in K.S. Goldstein and R.H. Byington, ed., Two Penny Ballads and Four Dollar Whiskey Hatboro: published for the Pennsylvania Folklore Society by Folklore Associates, 1966.

A report of an unidentified animal allegedly shot in Mexico. In the photograph, it looks canid. We cannot say if the photograph is genuine.See article at phantomsandmonsters.com; there seems to be a problem linking to the correct page from this site.

The Troy of which I speak was unsung by Homer, but residents will recognize from the picture that it is Troy (NY). And what has this fair city to do with cryptozoology? I hear you wonder. As far as I'm aware, not much at present, but about 1890 the situation was different.In those days, one of the residents of the town was Michael Griffa, who owned some kind of store and had a very unusual attraction. Hanging from the wall was a strange creature - stuffed, I hasten to add, not living. Its back was hairy, its underside the color of human flesh. The description I have to hand does not specify the shade of human flesh, but we can't have everything. The beast had four legs and a brace of wings, a pair of fins and the curly tail of a pig. Griffa claimed he had shot this creature in the Hudson.People used to gaze in wild surmise at this creature and no doubt some opinions were expressed as to what it might be, but they have gone unrecorded. Then one day some "learned doctors" turned up. Could they solve the identity of Griffa's grotesquery? In a word, no. They were at a loss.My own opinion, for what it's worth, is that somebody sewed bits of various animals together and then stuffed them. However, I am willing to give Griffa the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps he potted some hideous lusus naturae in the Hudson. You see, I didn't happen to be in Troy (NY) about 1890, so I did not see it myself.

Wednesday, 19 February 2014

One of the mysteries of the term rabbit is that nobody knows the origin of the word. It originally meant the young of the rabbit, the adult creature being known as a coney. In America, the term rabbit was applied, not to rabbits, but to various kinds of hare. We can trace the word rabbit back to sundry Germanic languages which have a word robbe, but beyond that we cannot go. We don't know the root of the word and its literal meaning.As for English coney, this comes from Latin cuniculus which is possibly derived from a Celtic word meaning 'little dog'.

One of my favorite mythological animals must be the Hippogriff. I don't know that anyone ever actually believed in this creature, but sculptures exist from early times. The most famous hippogriff however is probably the one in Ariosto's epic Orlando Furioso, in which the hero rides this beast to the moon, where he meets the patriarch Enoch, the prophet Elijah and St John the Baptist. Essentially, the Hippogriff contained sections of horse, eagle and lion - a heady combination.

Recently a number of sites to which I have tried to link to allow you to peruse the articles there have been unreachable. This is obviously due to a technical fault, possibly involving my computer. However, as my technical skills are limited, I am not sure what is happening. At present, I can only apologize.

Back in the 19th Century, people would venture to the Alps and the Jura, all keen to do a spot of shooting, dash it. They would say to their guide, "I say, foreigner chappie, I'd like to bag a few beasts. Can you show me where I might shoot a chamois?"

The guide would answer, in lowered tones, "Monsieur, ze chamois are two a penny and tout le monde shoots them. But have you ever heard of anyone who has shot a dahu?"

"Gad, no. What's a dahu?" his interlocutor would ask.

The guide would then tell him of the dahu, variously described as looking like a deer or fox, and out they would go looking for it, but never finding it. The chamois (or gems, as it is sometimes called) was quite safe to make its way along those precipitous precipices where it oftentimes perambulates.

The truth of the matter seems to be that the dahu was a practical joke that guides played on gullible tourists, taking them all over crag and crevasse, looking for a creature who had no existence outside their imagination. The notion was so popular it spread to guides in the Pyrenees.

Zachary Mann's recent article has gotten me thinking. At my time of life, not many things can do that. I reply to Descartes, Non cogito, sed sum. The matter upon which Zachary has managed to exercise my brain is, How come we have quite reasonable accounts of cryptids that are seen once, but once only? Obviously, if a creature were seen, say, in 1980, but its like was never again beheld, the likelihood of a breeding population in some niche seems remote.It is here I stray (as I have strayed before) into an area where many cryptozoologists refuse to tread: the possibility of a paranormal explanation for the existence of such animals.Let me clarify what I mean by paranormal. I do not mean something outside the laws of science as they exist, but rather outside the laws of science as we understand them. In physics, the most astonishing advances have been made in modern times, showing the possibility of things that the scientists of my youth would have dismissed as impossible and which even the man in the street would have regarded as beyond the bounds of credibility.Such animals, seen only once and nevermore, if they are not hoaxes or misperceptions, might have the following explanations:- (1) They might normally exist in different dimensions, in the same space as ours but vibrating at a different rate. Rarely the vibrations of that dimension and ours might coincide or it might be possible to wander from one dimension into another in certain circumstances and that is how we manage to see an animal that has no earthly counterpart. (2) Scientists are now beginning to admit the possibility ofuniverses other than our own and New York physicist Michio Kaku has even suggested it might be possible at some future date to migrate from one to another. However. what if such a possibility already exists and there are portals or wormholes that connect the universes? Single unknown creatures might make their way through them. (3) A third possibility is less speculative. How sure are we about what goes on in certain laboratories under the umbrella of genetic research? The odd monstrous hybrid, produced there, may make its escape and be sighted. (4) Further possibilities might include: animals breaking through the time barrier; animals perceived in another time by humans who can see through the time barrier; or even animals decanted from UFOs.All of this is, of course, mental meandering on my part; but I feel each of these possibilities merits consideration, as singular animals are sometimes reported once, but never again.

Tuesday, 18 February 2014

Having done quite an amount of study of Merfolk, I have a sneaking suspicion that behind the legend may lie an actual creature, hominid or pinniped, that bears a close relation to the archetypal mermaid image.

Here's an article on the subject. The link is playing up, so I'll give you the web address:-www.mysteriousbritain.co.uk/cryptozoology/faroe-islands.mermaid.html

A report by Craig Woolheater in Cryptomundo tells how he visited the exhibition of an alleged body of a dead Bigfoot and how Rick Dyer showed him further evidence afterwards. See photographs and read Craig's conclusions.

1856: The "Know-Nothing" American Party abolishes
its rule of secrecy. Members remain as ignorant as ever.

1930: In a seemingly pointless experiment, aviators milk a
cow aboard an aircraft in flight, seal its milk in paper containers, and
parachute it to earth. The procedure fails to start a trend.

1933: Renowned American anthropologist and ethnohistorian
Roderick Sprague is born in Albany, Oregon. Aside from mainstream research, he
collaborates with Dr. Grover Krantz in applying scientific reasoning to the
study of Sasquatch.

1961: Fishermen retrieve a juvenile giant squid from the
stomach of a catch off Câmara de Lobos, Madeira Island, in the Northeast
Atlantic.

In television the phrase for a character that comes into an episode and either dies or completes whatever role they need to (plot wise or character wise) and then disappears never to be seen or heard from again is called a one off character. Most of the time they are easily forgettable to the overall story. So what does this have to do with Cryptozoology I hear you ask? Well over the years certain Cryptids have become to put in a way that many Americans might better understand “Superstars.” The two undisputed kings of the Cryptid world are Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster. More time, money, theory and effort has been put into trying to examine these creatures by both believers and skeptics than pretty much all other Cryptids combined. Below them are Cryptids like the Jersey Devil, Mothman, and the Chupacabra. These guys get plenty of focus from the main stream and pop culture, but nowhere as much as Bigfoot and old Nessie.

Below them are Cryptids like Cadborosaurus and Mokele-Mbembe. These guys have certainly had a lot of time put into investigating them by some people and they do get talked about outside the Cryptozoology community at times, but never to the degree of something like the Jersey Devil and definitely not to the degree of Bigfoot. And as you go down the list of various Cryptids less and less people, even within the Cryptozoological world, will know about them. Sure some know or have an interest in these more than others, but you get my point. I have been interested in and researching Cryptids for years and I still hear about ones I’ve never heard of all the time. And I have read books and articles by men who have been at this longer than I have been alive and they even still find new Cryptids they have never heard of. It’s one of the many reasons I love this field so much, always something new to discuss. I personally refer to these kind of Cryptids as One Offs.

So the following is a brief look at a few of these kinds of Cryptids in the USA in modern times. This is by no means a definitive list, but some things to think about. If you (the reader) have any more information on these or other fascinating One Off Cryptids please feel free to share.

Batsquatch

On April 16, 1994, at 9:30 at night an eighteen year old student Brian Canfield was driving near Mount Rainier, Washington. Suddenly his car experienced failure causing his to stall. Then suddenly a creature descended from the sky above his car and landed in the road ahead of him. The beast was about nine feet tall with large wings. The head was wolf-like, it had sharp teeth, clawed hands and feet and bluish hair. After he had stared at it for a few minutes the creature flapped his wings and flew off into the night. Reported sightings of giant man-bats have a long history in many places of the world, but this is the only publicly known one from this part of America.

The Sherman Sloth

I have already written about it in one of my previous posts (White Things Part 2) but as I’m fascinated with the Cryptids known as White Things and this creature fits that description. For those of you haven’t read my past post or haven’t heard of it elsewhere, here it is. In 1970, author John Keel received an anonymous letter from a fifteen year old boy form the small town of Sherman, New York. He claimed that he, his family, and two other workers on their farm had seen on a number of occasions one (sometimes two) large white creatures on his property. He described them in his letter as resembling the prehistoric Ground Sloths. No more reported sightings have come from Sherman, so it might have been a hoax, then again maybe not.

Florida Llama

I remember reading on one of the few reliable Cryptid forums (most are un-moderated and let anybody post anything on them) about a man who after Hurricane Katrina hit the US saw a strange beast. He was heading back to his home after the devastation. While driving down the highway, he noticed a familiar yet at the same time strange looking creature. He described a creature that he very clearly as a llama walking down the road. He knew (as well as most people should) that these animals are not native to Florida. But what made him do more of a double take was the size of the llama and its longer slender neck and head. He said it was almost the same size as a large Elk or Moose. Llamas can grow fairly big, but they can’t approach that size. Yet Florida was home, until 10,000 years ago, a species called the Large Headed-Llama. It was bigger than any llama alive today. So could some of these creatures have survived? In all likelihood this was just an escaped animal from a farm or zoo. The Hurricane could have destroyed its pen, causing it to get lose. After all why has no one else in Florida seen such a large kind of creature?

Giant Armadillos

Staying in Florida, a woman retold the story of how when she was fifteen (same age as the Sherman boy) she lived in a residential suburban neighborhood near Tampa Bay area surrounded by woods and orange groves. Over the course of several nights she would see two to three animals come into her yard at night and dig it up. They were probably looking for food. She was able to get a very close look at them (from just feet away through the screen door) and said they looked just like armadillos, but they were between five and six feet long. That is far larger than the native species of armadillos native to Florida. In fact that sizes rivals the largest known armadillo alive today the Giant Armadillo (Priodontes maximus). Florida was once home to a number of large armadillos, could some still be alive? Again why has no one else have reported seeing them?

Georgia Velociraptor

On July, 25, 2008 a teenage boy and his Grandpa were hunting on his Grandpa’s property in Georgia. As they walked down a road they began to hear strange noises. They stopped and listened when suddenly a strange animal walked out of the bushes about 150 yards ahead of them into the road. It sniffed the air as it came into full view. The eyewitnesses said it walked on two feet, had a long tail, sharp claws on its hands and feet. In short he described it as looking like the Velociraptors from the famous Jurassic Park film. After the creature turned it made the strange noises they heard earlier and walked back into the woods. After it disappeared they left the woods and headed for home. A few things stick out to me about this sighting. First, I’m aware of a rather long history of these kinds of sightings from the southwest (namely Arizona and New Mexico, even several from Texas) but this is the first from Georgia. Second, is that the witness says it was about five feet tall, all the others from elsewhere in the country place them at only about three feet making it (if true) the biggest one on record. Third, I find it weird that in this and all Neo-therapod reports the eyewitnesses never seem to report feathers. We know that many therapods had feathers on them, so if they do represent therapods why no feathers?

Colorado Sauropod

Staying on “dinosaurs” in America, there is a long history of seemingly dinosaur like creatures in other places on earth, e.g., the Mokele-Mbembe of central Africa, but did you know that there was one really interesting such sighting from America? Well according to a bus driver in Colorado, in the 1970s he saw a creature on his bus route that was huge and unlike anything he ever saw before. He couldn’t identify the beast until he saw a book with a picture of a Diplodocus. I have to say outside the fact that no one else has ever come forward with such a sighting I find it strange that someone would be able to recognize a dinosaur when they see one. Sure I would be shocked and dumfounded, but I would know what it was, even if I didn’t believe what I was seeing.

Louisiana Spider

In 1948 in Leesville, Louisiana, William Slaydon his wife and three grand kids where walking to church on a cool night. As they walked down Highway 171 they were stunned to see a gigantic spider come out of a ditch ahead of them, cross the road and disappear. They described it as hairy, black and, most notably, as big as a wash tub. Needless to say, they never walked that way to church at night again. This would scare anyone, arachnophobic or not.

So there you have it. A brief look at some of these One Off Cryptids. Are they real? Do they represent unknown animals? With just one report it is hard to say, but if anyone has any more information on these or any other bizarre local Cryptid be sure to share. And if you are worried about being judged, I just what to let you know that (I think I speak for everyone here at CFZ USA) that we will always listen without judgment. After all if we don’t take the time to listen we will never begin to start to find the truth. And at the end of the day the truth, Cryptid or no Cryptid, is the ultimate goal of Cryptozoology. Editor's note: The so-called velociraptors in Jurassic Park were not actually velociraptors. They were another type of dinosaur - deinonychus.

1914: Actor (John) Arthur Kennedy born in Worcester, Mass.
His outré films include Fantastic Voyage, Crawlspace, Let Sleeping Corpses
Lie, The Antichrist, The Sentinel, Cave of the Sharks, and The Humanoid.

The Jersey here has nothing to do with New Jersey. It is one of the Channel Islands, a British dependency in the English Channel. There is an amusing legend there of a large and mysterious bull, which is worth reading.

I refer not to the metropolis of France, but to Paris, Texas. Thither Rick Dyer, who claims to have a dead Bigfoot to hand, is rumored to be making his way. Presumably he plans to stage some sort of event there.

Strange arches are ascribed by some to Bigfoot.The link here does not seem to be working. Go tobigfootevidence.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/how-does-this-ever-happen-bigfoot.html[Honestly, the things I could say about technology]

Keeping on the theme of Valentine's Day, in Norfolk, England, the Eve of St Valentine's was formerly a time of great celebration, almost vying with Christmas for popularity. A gift giver named Jack Valentine was supposed to come from house to house, delivering presents. He sometimes had variant forms, such as Old Father Valentine and Old Mother Valentine. The child in the house would open the door and find a parcel waiting.A variant form was Snatch Valentine. When he visited, the child would find a parcel, but, when he tried to pick it up, it was yanked away by a piece of string. He could not pursue it, because something unknown and awful would befall him should he see Snatch. This procedure was repeated several times, until at last the parcel was not pulled away.This custom had fallen into desuetude, but those in the Lanes Area of Norwich wished to revive it, so last night, Jack was on the prowl once again.

Many Forteans will have seen the movie or read the book Picnic at Hanging Rock (1967) by Joan Lindsay, which relates how a bunch of schoolgirls vanished from Australia on St Valentine's Day, 1900. This occurred at the Hanging Rock a celebrated site. At the end of the book, the author says the story may be either fact or fiction - it is for the reader to make up his own mind. This has led it to appear in some Fortean literature as definitely historical.Many years ago, I decided to look into the matter. The book contains an allusion to data about the event being sent to the Society for Psychical Research in London. I wrote to them and they replied saying the statement in the book was inaccurate. They added that, while the Society itself held no position on the alleged incident, they had been told by an investigator that the work was entirely fictitious and this has subsequently become generally accepted.Joan Lindsay's last chapter, explaining the mystery, was not included in the original book, but was published posthumously in 1987. In this it we are told the girls who climbed the rock went through a kind of portal, except for one who was unable to do so. Before going, they threw their whalebone corsets, which may perhaps be seen as symbolic of servitude, into the air.